One more thing worth making explicit

I'm not a philosopher at all. I'm a social scientist. Spend a lot of time (even leisure time - how sick is that?) thinking about the way humans behave. But I don't think about it the way philosophers think about it.

But there's overlap, of course. As a citizen and a social scientist I'm going to be interested in things that people who are citizens and philosophers are interested in, like democracy. As a guy that thinks a lot and a social scientist I'm going to be interested in things that people who think a lot and are philosophers are interested in, like the way humans assess and collect knowledge about the world around them.

But we'll often think about it in very different ways. And that's OK - neither side "owns" these sorts of issues. But I won't always live up to the expectations of people who want it laid out philosophically. I'm generally unequipped to do that. I am not an imbecile, though, and am vaguely familiar with enough philosophy to know that there are some well regarded guys I think basically have it right and I prefer them to other well regarded guys.

If you want a strictly philosophical answer to a question that concerns humans very broadly, you're best off asking a philosopher that broadly agrees with me but is trained to talk about it like a philsopher talks about it. I'm happy to give it a shot, it just may be embarassing for me (and if it's really bad - maybe even for you, as in "why am I even reading this nut").